


The Story of Daibazaal

by spooky_mars



Category: Voltron: Legendary Defender
Genre: Family Bonding, Gen, Minor Klance, galra background, implied klance, story time with krolia, takes place after s6, yorak origin
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2018-06-23
Updated: 2018-12-21
Packaged: 2019-05-27 03:55:32
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 2
Words: 2,960
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/15016139
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/spooky_mars/pseuds/spooky_mars
Summary: During their trip back to Earth, Lance asks a question to fill the silence.





	1. The Creation of Daibazaal

Keith bit his lip, focused on getting back to Earth safely. They were still galaxies away from their destination. For the last two hours or so, the paladins and their passengers had been flying in silence, aside from the occasional sigh or loud moo from Kaltenecker. 

 

Keith winced when a voice broke the silence. It was Lance. “Hey, uh, Krolia, right?” Lance asked, his face shortly appearing on Keith’s screen.

 

Keith let out a worried groaned as the Galra in question moved next to him.

 

“Yes, what is it?” Krolia raised an eyebrow and shared a look with her son.

 

“Er, tell us about how Galrans were, back before the whole evil Zarkon thing.”

 

Keith looked up at his mother, then back to Lance’s nervous face awaiting an answer. Pidge’s face was the next one to appear on Keith’s screen, her face was contorted into one of confusion and horror.

 

“What the heck, Lance? You don’t just ask someone their backstory when you just met them!” She shouted.

 

“How do you get to know someone, then?” Lance shouted back.

 

Keith’s wolf barked, confused by the sudden loudness. Both of the yelling paladins silenced themselves and Krolia smiled. “I’d love to tell you, Lance.”

 

Keith let a small huff escape his lips. Leave it to Lance to solve awkward tensions.

 

Krolia’s smile widened a bit, and she started her storytelling, “Where do I start? Well, let’s give out the basics. Daibazaal was home to the Galra, as I’m sure most of you know. From what I’ve heard, it was beautiful. Nothing compared to Altea, but beautiful in its own way.”

 

Alura’s face popped up onto the screen too, and she offered Krolia a small smile. Keith turned his attention to his mother as she recounted the stories she was told.

 

“Daibazaal started with these majestic, ethereal, and powerful deities, according to legend. There were five of them: Kerlmic, Drionder, Heltark, Rewobun, and Jeltrist. Kerlmic was the war deity, Drionder the plant deity, Rewobun the Animal deity, Heltark the Life deity, and Jeltrist was the all powerful deity. He had control over everything, and could’ve easily destroyed Daibazaal under his fingertips. Er, paws.”

 

Lance started coughing, and Pidge let out a disgruntled noise. Keith threw their images a dirty look, and they both pursed their lips.

 

“And Jeltristwas?” Shiro voice questioned from behind the Galra duo.

 

“Jeltrist was a humanoid. He was mixed with a wolf. He was the only humanoid, as the rest of the deity were the first Galra. Together the five deities turned Daibazaal into its glory. Jeltrist and Heltark worked to create the Galra civilization, and Drionder and Rewobun provided the living standards, of course. Kerlmic was the deity of war, but he was the one to keep Galra in line. He trained them to fight to the death, but to never fight each other.”

 

Lance let out a low whistle, “This Kerlmic dude seems like a bummer.”

 

Krolia ignored him, instead moving on the the tale of Galran lifestyle, “Back then, poverty didn’t exist. Everyone was equal, except for the deities, of course.”

 

Keith rolled his eyes upon hearing Lance mutter “communists” under his breath.

 

“Everyone was a strong individual, but together they were stronger. Any planet that challenged the Galra were defeated quickly. The Galra rarely ever started a fight, and they were very peaceful. During this Golden Age, the deities decided to create a Galra above the others. This Galra’s purpose was to be the leader when the deities faded away or died. His name was Yorak, and everyone loved him.”

 

Keith’s head snapped up to meet his mother’s eyes. She was already looking down at him, her eyes soft. “Rewobun and Drionder taught Yorak everything about harvest, and taking care of livestock. It’s through him that recipes were passed down for generations. Kerlmic taught Yorak all of the Galra fighter moves. Heltark told Yorak the secret balance to keeping everyone alive and well. And Jeltrist? Well, Jeltrist gave him immortality. Yorak couldn’t die. He was to be the leader of the Galra for years to come.”

 

Keith looked back to Shiro, who looked as interested in this story as everyone else seemed. Keith smiled, happy that his fellow paladins- er, friends- seemed to like his mom.

 

-

 

Lance eagerly grinned as Krolia’s eyes brightened on his screen. “There were popular ancient dances the Galra did.”

 

“What kind of dances?” Lance asked suggestively.

 

Krolia blinked, and Keith growled, “ _ Lance _ .”

 

“Hey, it was an innocent question!” Lance pouted, and Kaltenecker mooed behind him.

 

“Thank you, buddy!” Lance grinned at the cow and patted her head fondly.

 

“Er,” Krolia stuttered, trying to think.

 

Lance frowned, guilt flooding through him. “Listen, I’m sorry. You don’t have to describe the dance. Or even keep telling us about-”

 

“No, it’s fine.” Krolia waved him off. “I’m just thinking about how the dance went.”

 

Krolia turned to Shiro and motioned for him to stand next to Keith. Shiro did so, and watched as Krolia went behind the pilot seat, though she was still visible. Keith was turned around in his seat, watching. 

 

Lance gasped as Krolia  _ dropped _ into a flurry of hip hop dance moves, coming up with a body roll and a snap of her fingers. Keith turned back around in his seat, wide eyed as his mother returned to his side.

 

“Wow,” Pidge breathed.

 

“W-what was that?” Lance sputtered.

 

“Something I learned from Kolivan. Said it was a sort of ancient party dance.” Krolia shrugged.

 

“Wow, that was really good!” Hunk laughed, his face now appearing on the screen. The others nodded in agreement.

 

“Thank you. There were a lot of other dances too, but I haven’t learned any others.”

 

“On the subject of parties, let’s talk about food.It’s where I shine.”Hunk grinned.

 

“Yorak, Rewobun, and Drionder were very good at keeping everyone happy with what they ate. There are multiple ancient dishes still made today. Snail with raspberry sauce-”

 

Krolia was interrupted by a confused grunt from Hunk. “ _ Snail _ ? With  _ raspberry sauce _ ?”

 

“It’s a delicacy!” Krolia exclaimed. “Anyway, those three were people pleasers when it came to food. Yorak and Heltark kept everyone healthy and beyond happy with their lives. Together Kerlmic and Yorak made the Galra  _ stronger _ , which seemed impossible to the other civilizations.”

 

“I’m really rooting for this Yorak guy, wow.” Hunk piped up. 

 

Lance hummed in agreement, and Krolia’s grin seemed to darken.

 

“Sadly, Jeltrist was the first deity to die. Kerlmic shortly after. Then, Drionder. Yorak became worried, and tried to protect Rewobun and Heltark from their now inevitable death. No one knew why they were dying so quickly, everything seemed fine. So Yorak continued to lead the Galra, always tense and ready for some sort of fight.”

 

“I don’t like where this is going,” Hunk’s sentence trailed off as he stared worriedly.

 

“Rewobun was the next to die. If it makes you feel any better, she died in the cattle barn, during a nap.”

 

“That hurts my heart!” Hunk exclaimed. “That doesn’t make me feel any better!”

 

“Then of course, Heltark died. This left Yorak all alone, with no one to support him or guide him. He was on his own.”

 

Lance furrowed his brows as Keith’s eyes widened, his mouth tilting down a little. If Lance didn’t know any better, he’d say Keith was horrified.

 

“What happened to my buddy Yorak?” Lance asked, Keith face causing the blue paladin to be worried as well.

 

“Everything was good and well for a few years, nothing went horribly bad,” Krolia assured. “Except when Yorak forgot to feed the livestock for two days, and the town almost went without food for a week. The townspeople were angry that Yorak was messing up. He’d been doing well for centuries, and now that the deities we gone, he’d already messed up twice.”

 

“That’s stupid!” Pidge exclaimed. “They’re living well, and because of  _ one  _ slip up from their leader, and they’re gonna get mad?”

 

“Yes,” Krolia replied. “A Galra named Tenskrig wanted Yorak gone.”

 

“Hah!” Hunk exclaimed. “Joke’s on him, Yorak is immortal.”

 

Krolia nodded, “So Tenskrig came up with this plan to kill Yorak. He and a few other Galra would ask Yorak to help them with their garden, and when their leader’s back was turned, they would do the ever classic knife in the back.”

 

“That’s not cool,” Lance frowned. “This dude is working his butt off for his people and they’re going to try to kill him. Blocked and Reported, in my book.”

 

“I didn’t know you owned a book,” Keith muttered.

 

“I heard that!”

 

Krolia shook her head fondly, “Well, they did get Yorak to the garden. Most of the Galra in on the plan had backed out, and it left Tenskrig and a Galra lady named Felbva. Yorak knew something was off when he turned to look at the plants, so he turned around and took a knife to the skull.”

 

“Ouch!” Lance winced at the thought of a knife penetrating a  _ skull _ . Not a fun thing to think about.

 

“Yorak died in that garden.”

 

“What?” Pidge exclaimed.

 

“But I thought he couldn’t die.” Allura’s brows furrowed.

 

“He couldn’t die,” Krolia explained. “But I never said he couldn’t be killed.”

 

“Stupid immortality loopholes,” Hunk muttered.

 

“Why do all of my favorite characters die?” Pidge grumbled.

 

“Tenskrig and Felbva got together, and lead the Galra together. They were horrible, horrible leaders. They kept everything good or worth anything for themselves, and gave their people garbage, essentially. They did have a son though, and they named him Zarkon.”

 

“What a hot minute, there,” Lance interrupted. “What?”

 

“Zarkon had parents, Lance,” Pidge explained, her tone slow, like she was talking to a child.

 

“Wow,” Lance shrugged. “What a shocker.” 

“Despite what most think, Zarkon was one of the best leaders once his parents died. On Daibazaal, there was now a lot of poverty. A lot of people were mad, upset, or jealous. Zarkon acknowledged that, and he worked to try and help his people. He was their last hope.”

 

“Wait a minute,” Pidge cut in. “Sorry for interrupting, but wasn’t there some sort of deity or something the Galra had faith in?”

 

“That was Zarkon,” Krolia frowned. “He was known as a Zuptor, to the Galra.”

 

“What’s a Zuptor?” Hunk questioned.

 

“Who,” Krolia corrects, and behind her, Shiro raises an eyebrow.

 

“The Zuptor is someone believed to have the spirit of Yorak in them. The term was only used for Zarkon, since he was a much more considerate leader than his parents.”

 

“Oh!” Pidge’s eyes brightened. “So kind of like a Dalai Lama?”

 

Krolia’s eyebrows furrowed, and she frowned, “I’m assuming that’s an Earth thing?”

 

Keith hummed a yes, and Krolia went on. “Zarkon was actually doing really well as Zuptor. He did all that he could. Then of course, the demand for quintessence arose.”

 

Allura winced, and Lance could see Coran putting a hand on her shoulder.

 

“Alfor had created Voltron at this point, and because their Zuptor was the head of Voltron, they had firm belief Zarkon could get them what they wanted. We all know where that ended up.”

 

Lance frowned, looking at all of the solemn faces on his screen. Among them, Keith’s looked more yearning, like he wanted to know  _ more _ . Lance brightened, understanding what it was Keith wanted to know.

 

“Hey, what about you?”

 

Krolia stared at him. “What- what about me?”

 

“How were you raised? Like, tell us what it was like to be a Galra child when the war was happening.” Lance smiled as Keith’s eyes glimmered with interest.

 

“Well, it wasn’t that bad, considering Kolivan had raised me with the rest of the Blades. There was this food called Tewlmench, and it was berries with chocolate on top of this sort of sponge bowl.”

 

“Oh! I remember that! Zarkon shared the recipe with my father, and I only got to eat it during meetings. It was delicious,” Allura beamed.

 

Krolia smiled back, “I learned some dances, as you learned. They were my pride, because I was apparently outstanding at dancing. I trained with the blades a lot, as well. It was a really nice childhood, actually. And then I grew up, and Keith became my new pride and joy.”

 

Everyone ‘aw’ed as Keith flushed. Lance beamed at the red paladin, happy that he was finally getting some praise from someone other than Shiro or Iverson.

 

Lance smiled and leaned back, “Hey Krolia, do you have any embarrassing baby stories about Keith?”

 

“Like you wouldn’t believe.”

 

“Mom no!”


	2. Baby Picture Pt. 1

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Krolia pulls out some polaroids, and Keith has some more bonding moments.

Keith groaned as his friends giddily encouraged his mother to share baby stories. Of course, Krolia was going to comply. She hadn’t been a real mother for quite some time but the concept of embarrassing her son seemed to be a universal thing she understood.

Smiling faintly, Krolia pulled something out of one of the many hidden pockets of her suit. Keith strained to see one and let out a small gasp. They were baby pictures.

_Krolia had kept his baby pictures with her all throughout a space war._

Keith’s heart melted a little, dripping with shock and love for his mother. She looked at him and smiled, Keith smiling back at her easily. She scanned the dashboard of the lion, making a little ‘aha!’ when she found the slot she wanted. She took the first polaroid out of the stack and inserted it into the slot, and immediately a holographic version of the picture appeared in from of everyone.

Chaos ensued.

Allura, Romelle, and Coran immediately started questioning everything in the photo. They questioned the highchair, the “strange creature” on his bib, the flowers in the background, and what “peanut butter” was.

Hunk and Shiro cooed while Pidge and Lance stared hard at the bib. (“Is that Tweety Bird?” “No, you idiot.”)

Krolia corralled their attention simply by clearing her throat. She quickly explained everything that was confusing to the Alteans then proceeded to tell the story.

“Keith really loved peanut butter, for some reason. I first gave it to him by accident because I had mistaken it for baby food. After that, he would rarely eat his _actual_ baby food, and would always favor peanut butter over anything else his father and I tried to feed him.

“We finally relented to letting him eat peanut butter, and when he started getting teeth and could eat crunchier foods, we gave him crunchy peanut butter. It was a simple time.” Krolia kneaded Keith’s shoulder calmly as if she didn’t just expose that Keith was basically as Pidge was now.

Keith jumped as Pidge’s excited voice pierced through the comms. “Keith! You’re my Peanut Butter Buddy now! Lance and Hunk both prefer jelly, so now I finally have someone who understands! Wow, am I blessed,” Pidge sighed happily.

Keith let a tentative smile come onto his lips, failing to keep his eyes from softening at Pidge’s excitement.

 “Peanut Butter Buddies for life,” he assured, happy to have something very lasting and positive with Pidge since the last Moment he could remember with her was yelling at her for wanting to leave Voltron.

Keith winced at the memory a bit but brightened when he heard Pidge’s triumphant yell. Krolia blinked, probably shocked at what had just happened. Nevertheless, she pulled out the photo from the slot and inserted a new one.

This one was of Keith in the bathtub, his hair drenched, his eyes glaring, and a pout on his face. Keith knew what this would be about: his hate of baths, or more specifically, his hate of water. It wasn’t a fear, he just hated how water felt on his scalp and on his skin.

Krolia gave him a knowing look, catching the similar pout and glare on his face due to her about to share the story.

“Keith hated baths,” she simply stated. “He didn’t like having his hair wet.”

“What?” Lance screamed, making everyone jump.

Keith sighed, knowing where this argument was going to go.

“Mullet, you’re telling me you didn’t like baths? That’s insane! It’s like a little part of the ocean in your home!” Lance continued, ignoring Pidge’s jab that the ocean was salt water and that you couldn’t take a bath in it.

Keith huffed and opted to ignore the dreamy look on Lance’s face at the memory of baths. “Water feels weird on your skin and on your scalp. I don’t like it. Simple as that.”

Lance shook his head. “That doesn’t make any sense. Why were you going to the pool the day the power went out if you don’t like water?”

Keith stiffened but quickly recovered and rolled his eyes. “Maybe I wanted to see if Altean water was somehow different.”

Lance raised an eyebrow, but thankfully let it go. “Whatever, Mullet. More pool time alone for me.”

Everyone winced, remembering why they were all cramped in the lions in the first place. Lance realized what he’d said and deflated. “Sorry,” he murmured.

Keith panicked. He’d been the cause of the group feeling down once again. He mentally scrambled for something to lighten the mood. He gave Lance a hopefully-convincing-but-definitely-guarded smile. “I’ll tell you what, Lance, next chance we get, you can try to change my mind about water.”

Lance’s eyes twinkled at the thought of a challenge. “Consider it done.” he winked, and Keith prayed to Jeltrist that his helmet covered his flushed face.

Krolia inserted the next photo: a picture of Keith with a cowboy hat, falling to his face.

Everyone made a confused noise, and Keith stifled his own laughter. He looked absolutely ridiculous in the photo and completely fell into the “Cowboy, Baby” category Lance had put him in.

“So,” Pidge giggled. “Whats’ the story on this one?”

**Author's Note:**

> This was written for the Voltron Games, so for all of you wanting a sequel, I'll be working on it after the games are over! :) Thanks for all of the kudos and comments! [EDIT: I said I would have it done before August, but it looks like it might take a bit longer. I will try to have it done before Season 7 comes out! Though I did get some artists on board, so I'll also be waiting to publish everything at once.]


End file.
